Richmond Research

Formally industrial, Richmond has gradually turned into a residential suburb due to economic crisis (in mid 1900s) which caused factories to shut down

Huge influx of South East Asian refugees to the Richmond Housing Estate in 1960s as a result of Vietnam War
The 20 storey Richmond Housing Estate is an act of the government in 1937-1960s to improve the living conditions of workmen and to reduce slum activity
On the surface, Richmond appears to be a typical inner Melbourne suburb, but we peeled the shell which revealed interesting territory behaviours and living conditions, particularly
the informal way of living and working within a formal structure. For example, people grow and harvest vegetables in the Housing Estate community garden and sell them every weekend
in front of existing grocery stores along Victoria Street, the 2-3 storey grocery store and restaurant owners lease their upper floors to workers within the same store, or to
people with low income, people living in the Housing Estate lease their bedrooms to friends or strangers for cash, exchange/selling of cultural herbs and vegetables within the
Housing Estate or fake marriages to legally bring people over from South-East Asia to Australia.

These informal activities all happen within a section from Victoria Street, through stores, community garden, Housing Estate, primary school to Highett Street. The Victoria Street –
Highett street section work together as a whole and it shows the interesting inter-relation of people and usage.

We interviewed 10 people on sight within a 200m radius, starting from the Housing estate

Filipe is now 28 and living in the city with his girlfriend. He migrated into Australia with his parents when he was 1 year old. His family and relatives had been
living the RHE until he was 6 years old (1991). They moved to St Alban because his parents thought Richmond was not a safe place (people shooting up, violence in the laundry,
drugs) and
St Alban was the area they could afford to buy a house and there was a small Temorese community. He used to go to Richmond West Community School.
Filipe used to play in the playground of the RHE with his friends who also lived in the same housing

Hung (36-Vietnamese) has been in Australia for 8 years. He came here by a ‘fake marriage deal’ and was living the RHE for 3 years with his sister. He had then moved to
Burnley (conflict with his sister) for 1 year, Coburg for 2 years, Collingwood housing for half of a year, St Alban for 1 year and now he and his family (‘real’ wife and kids) are
living
in a Commission housing in Fizroy. Hung goes to his friends on the weekends to have drinks with them. They usually cook traditional Vietnamese food and sing karaoke together. The
children are only allowed to play inside the flat

Yen (Vietnamese) is living with her husband and two children. They have been living in the RHE for 15 years. She is living on pension and her husband is working as sole
trader (handy man).

Sam is an elder living by himself in the RHE. He came to RHE 5 years ago because he could not afford the rent in East Melbourne. He likes living in this area.
Sam (local, 80) used to work in the post office in the CBD when he was living in east Melbourne. Moved here 5 years ago and now he 'take things easy'
Sam's hobby is to walk around the area to exercise and to go to the pub to have drinks with friends

Michelle (local, 30, mother of a toddler) has moved here 1 month ago and she works in Ferntree Gully

Annum (African, 35) came here 8 years ago. Mother of 3 children. She is unemployed and is not currently looking for a job
Annum and her kids go to the shop on the weekend to have fun and buy toys for the kids. She is afraid of the drug dealer and addicts around this area

Lee (Croatian, 25, on wheelchair) has finished bachelor of computer science at Monash University in 2010 and he is looking for a job. He just moved here a month ago

Tung (Vietnamese, 42) has been here for 7 years and he works in the farm in Lilydale, Ballarat and Bendigo in the summer

Daniel (Ireland, came here 35 years ago, 40 years old, look like a drug dealer) is unemployed. Works on sculpture in his spare time